Check 'Yes'
by Lisa Telramor
Summary: Saguru gets an unexpected invitation to Aoko and Kaito's wedding. He intends to not go, at least until Akako declares that he's going to be her date. "I will pick you up next week," Koizumi said, "so be ready." She took a breath and added cheerfully, "Oh, and all couples are sharing a room. Hope you don't mind." Akako/Saguru, Kaito/Aoko


_AN: I started this planning to focus on the porn, but as usual, the setup took so long it might as well have been not had the sex at all, and the sex scene took the longest to write. _ I wonder sometimes why I write porn at all with this pattern._

 _Anyway, outside of my norm, I come bearing het! And so soon after my last het pairing fic. o.o Not quite sure I hit Akako right in this, but I haven't written her very much. :/ For the uncensored version, check out my LJ or AO3 account. I cut the sex scene from this entirely. __

 _This was written for the prompt: any, any pairing you never wrote before, pretend couple AU! someone gets invited to a wedding and for one reason or another need to find a wedding date at the last minute. a whole day of drinking and possibly a shared bed in a hotel room happen_

~O~O~O~O~O~

The invitation came on a Tuesday, postmarked three weeks ago with a note from the postmaster regrettably informing him that the letter had been misfiled, and thus only now was being delivered. Inside, Saguru found an eight by twelve centimeter card cordially inviting him to the wedding of one Nakamori Aoko and the ever irrepressible Kuroba Kaito. Alongside that was an RSVP card with a deadline and a request that he bring a date. Saguru could all but see Kuroba's mischievous grin as he added that last bit, no doubt wondering what sort of person Saguru would find as a date. It was rather presumptuous of him to think that Saguru would attend.

Then again, it was also a surprise to be invited at all. A continued career of Kid chasing after high school had led to a closer friendship with the Nakamori family than in high school, but Saguru had never withdrawn his belief that Kuroba was Kid.

Saguru tossed the invitation on the table with the rest of the mail and examined the RSVP form. Naturally, tomorrow was the last day to respond. He sighed.

There was no helping it. There was slim to none likelihood of finding a date in that time let alone mailing the response. Perhaps Nakamori-keibu could pass along the message that he would not be attending? He no longer had Kuroba or Aoko's most recent phone numbers.

He reached for his morning tea. Kuroba would probably be happier with him not attending anyway; he could consider it a wedding gift.

Saguru was reaching for the newspaper when a knock came from the dining room doorway. Baaya stuck her head through.

"Saguru-bocchama, you have a phone call."

"On the home phone line?" Anyone who called him tended to use his cell phone. "Did the caller give a name?"

Baaya shook her head. "The voice is female though. She apologizes for interrupting your breakfast."

Saguru looked at his cup of tea and the crumbs left over from Baaya's eggs and toast. There wasn't much to interrupt at this point. He left the table and the last of his tea behind as he headed for the hall phone.

"Hello?" Saguru said, putting the receiver to his ear.

"Hakuba-san," a voice he hadn't heard for a long time said on the other end of the line. "So nice to hear your voice. I hear your career is picking up."

"Koizumi-san." Saguru frowned. He hadn't heard anything about Koizumi since graduation. To be honest, she had not been on his radar much before then either. In a distant way, he had been flustered by her. She held a strangely infatuating presence and, in his usual fashion, he'd avoided her because back then he'd thought he couldn't afford any distractions, let alone a romantic one. He hadn't realized she had his home phone number. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"I heard through the grape vine that you haven't replied to Kaito-kun and Aoko-chan's wedding invitation." She sounded smug, and Saguru was instantly wary. Her timing was perhaps too good; it always had been, he thought, remembering the occasions she had shown up and whisked Kuroba away before Saguru could lay out a piece of damning evidence to see Kuroba squirm or otherwise goad Kuroba into revealing himself as Kid. "I thought to myself, why wouldn't Hakuba Saguru be punctual in responding? And then I thought, perhaps it is the date requirement."

"Koizumi-san, I am capable of acquiring a date—" Saguru started, feeling irritated, when Koizumi cut him off.

"Oh, I'm sure. I'm sure I could also find a date at a wave of my hand. However, as you do not currently have a date—" Saguru wanted to protest this assumption on principle even if it would have been a lie. He also wanted to explain that he had not, in fact, received his invitation until a few minutes ago, but Koizumi didn't seem inclined to give him a word edgewise. "—and must attend the wedding—Aoko-chan was very sad to have not heard from you, you see—I took the liberty of including you as my date in my RSVP."

"What?"

"I will be wearing a crimson and black dress, so coordinate to match. Of course, since you're coming as my guest, the hotel booking will be under my name. If you come wearing a tweed suit, I will be very annoyed."

"Koizumi-san!" Saguru protested. "I wasn't planning on attending the wedding at all! It seemed better to not attend as Kuroba dislikes me."

"Kaito-kun can't dislike either of us that much," Koizumi said. "We wouldn't have made it on the guest list. However you look at it, he has some respect for you because if he truly hated you, not even Aoko-chan could have convinced him to add you." More seriously she added, "Truthfully I think we're invited to keep Kaito-kun in line so he doesn't end up sabotaging his own wedding night. That would be a wonderful way to start off a marriage; Aoko-chan trying to kill her husband because he pranked the guests and ruined the reception hall."

That was all too easy to picture. Saguru winced at the thought of even a potential romantic action, like magicking flowers and doves, going awry. While he thought Kuroba had more than enough finesse to pull such things off, he had to wonder how adept Kuroba's sleight of hand would be after a few rounds of celebratory drinks. "So we were intended to be chaperones?"

"Oh, no, I imagine Aoko-chan invited us because in many ways we're as close to friends as Kuroba has." A note of wistfulness had Saguru pausing, wondering if he was seeing a deeper side to Koizumi, but her next words made him dismiss the thought. "Anyway, you will be useful in keeping the wedding in one piece and are appropriately handsome arm candy for the event."

"So pleased I meet your standards," Saguru said drily.

"You're handsome, but Kuroba's easier on the eye. Now if you would crack a smile…" There was a playful leer in her voice and Saguru felt his cheeks go warm even with the separation between them. "I will pick you up next week," Koizumi said, "so be ready." She took a breath and added cheerfully, "Oh, and all couples are sharing a room. Hope you don't mind."

The line clicked and Saguru was frozen staring at the floral painting above the phone table not quite knowing what to think. On one hand, Koizumi flirted with everyone. In their senior year, there were rumors of her dating half the men in their class at the least, simultaneously. Although considering the rumors were spread by women in the class whose boyfriends had turned astray, perhaps it was nothing but a rumor. On the other hand, she had called him handsome and pointed out that they would be sharing a hotel room for the night. Was it intended to be a date? Or was Koizumi leading him to his own conclusions like she had so many others?

He shook his head and frowned. Saguru still hadn't agreed to go to the wedding. Apparently he wasn't being given a choice in the matter though.

"Is something wrong?" Baaya asked, wandering back out into the hallway now that Saguru's conversation was finished.

"It seems I need to get a new suit. I have a wedding to attend in a week."

This would probably blow up in his face, like all things involving Kuroba did in some form or another. He chose to take the optimistic route for once and consider that Kuroba would hopefully be too caught up in Aoko to give Saguru's presence any thought at all.

~O~O~O~

Saguru buttoned his shirtsleeves and looked in the mirror one last time. His hair was neat, his dark red dress shirt was perfectly pressed, as were his black slacks. All that was left was to put on his tie and suit jacket. He'd spent far more time on his appearance than he would ever admit, between trying on shirts and suits to find the most flattering shade of red and the best cut for his body, to primping until every strand of hair fell just how he wanted it to. On an ordinary day, Kuroba could probably take one look and see right through it all and laugh himself hoarse. In truth, Saguru was more than a little nervous. He could count the number of dates he had had on one hand, and the more that he thought about it, the more the situation felt like a date.

With another date, Saguru probably would have been fine without all this preparation, but Koizumi had always had a sense of unreachability around her. Hopefuls crowded at her feet and a lucky few managed to catch scraps of her affection. He was a bit ashamed to think that he hoped she would look twice in his direction for reasons other than Kuroba's sake.

Saguru put the tie around his neck and looped it through the knot on automatic. As usual, it sat it a perfect, symmetrical Windsor. The tie was black; his shirt and a flower for his lapel would be the only splash of color for him. The intended effect was to compliment whatever Koizumi's dress was in the colors, but not draw attention from her as going on his knowledge of how she dressed outside of class in high school, she favored eye-catching designs and colors and enjoyed being in the center of attention. He slid the tie tack on, flipped his collar back down, and slid on his suit jacket. The final touch, the flower, was in Baaya's hands.

She nodded approvingly as he moved to the entryway to wait for Koizumi's arrival. "Your date might have trouble keeping you to herself," Baaya murmured, pinning the burgundy rose to his lapel.

"Baaya!" Saguru said, half scandalized as she smoothed his jacket collar flat. "Truly, it is likely to be the other way around."

Baaya sniffed. "If your date gives her affection to other men, then she's not worth a second date."

He wanted to point out the double standard of that comment compared to her statement of his own attractiveness, but decided it wasn't worth the argument. She had raised enough eyebrows when she learned Koizumi would be the one picking him up rather than the other way around. "We're just old classmates," Saguru said, more to remind himself than convince her. "I was probably invited so she didn't have to choose a real date."

Baaya's lips pursed, clearly disbelieving. She looked him over again, slow and lingering in a way that meant she was cataloguing all the ways he was taken more care than usual to appear put together. To her, that was argument enough that it was a date in truth.

"…Wishful thinking," Saguru muttered.

There was a knock on the door. The hall clock showed four minutes until Koizumi was due to arrive, but not everyone was as obsessed as he was to arrive on the dot. Baaya answered the door.

Koizumi was dressed in a form-fitting red halter-top dress with a plunging neckline. It had a slit high on the thigh of the skirt where it flared out with layers of black and red ruffles, framing the pale length of her thigh dramatically. Saguru snapped his eyes back to her face, blushing at catching himself gaping. Koizumi looked smug.

"Well, well," she said, taking a step past Baaya to stand in front of Saguru. "You do clean up nicely." Her eyes flitted from the sliver of red dress shirt to the black tie, to the rose, then traced down his body in a once over near identical to the one he had just given her.

Baaya's eyebrows were almost to her hair line. Well, Koizumi was not the sort of girl Saguru had previously dated.

Belatedly, Saguru's manners kicked in. "Koizumi-san, you're looking lovely as usual."

"Only as usual?" Koizumi laughed warmly. "I suppose I'll have to try harder next time."

"Ah. I meant." Dear Lord, he was blushing and fumbling over his words like he was in high school all over again. "You look very nice. It has been too long since we last spoke."

"Hmm." She smiled. He couldn't tell if it was a good sound or a bad one. "We will have plenty of time to catch up over the course of the evening, then won't we?" Koizumi set one hand on Saguru's arm and tugged.

He went along with it like a balloon on a string, feeling just about as grounded as one. "Have a good evening, Baaya," Saguru said in a rush. "I will see you at some point tomorrow."

If Baaya answered, he didn't hear it. Koizumi led them down the walk at a brisk pace toward a car parked in the drive. She opened a back passenger door and slid in, bunching fabric of her dress with practiced ease as she left room for Saguru to sit alongside her. So the car had a driver. He shouldn't be surprised.

Saguru took the offered seat and clicked his seat belt in place.

"So," Koizumi said as the car began moving, "I hear you went on to university after graduation?"

"In forensic science, yes." With minors in organic chemistry and criminal law because he had wanted a challenge. Kid, on a heist not long after he settled on this path, had said wanting to be challenged was synonymous with being masochistic. Considering that Saguru still regularly chased Kid even after years of failure, he couldn't necessarily say he was wrong. "I will admit that I spend less time active on cases than I did in the past." He could have remained a private detective or even become a police detective, but as time had gone on, he found he preferred piecing the puzzle together from the evidence than facing the darker side of humanity head on; he never did come to an understanding of why someone would do horrific things outside of the abstract. He thought maybe he did not have what it took to face criminals head on without becoming disillusioned with humanity as a whole. Kid heists and examining crime scenes for minute details were his most active these days, with the occasional personal investigation on the side.

"And you, Koizumi-san?" He had heard nothing about her after graduation at all. He hadn't even known Aoko had kept in touch.

"Guess," she said with a grin. "Or deduce if you can, detective that you are."

"An unlikely possibility in this case," Saguru said. "Deductions off of calluses and chance fibers visible to the eye for a person's life are largely only possible in fiction." Koizumi tilted her head, amused, and it made him want to say something more. He looked her over. "You seem to have been well off since graduation at any rate." The dress was expensive cloth and tailored to fit; costly. The bracelets at her wrists and the necklace at her throat appeared to be real gold and rubies.

"Yes, well, we both come from well off backgrounds," Koizumi said with a shrug. "I also went to university."

"Oh?" Not unexpected, but at the same time he couldn't think of what she would have studied. He couldn't remember her showing any school subject a preference over another.

"History and literature focusing in particular around pagan studies." She grinned, a challenge like she expected him to dismiss her interest in the subject. As someone who had studied all of Doyle's works for pleasure at one point or another (including texts on spiritualism and the supernatural), Saguru didn't feel inclined to judge. "I studied abroad in Europe."

"Was there a particular era you focused on?" Saguru asked, still thinking about the Spiritualist movement.

"I focused my studies around tracing a particular subset of witchcraft, following its history and methods. It is not well known among the public."

"I see." Saguru didn't know enough about the topics to provide any sort of elaboration on the subject, and couldn't say he was immediately interested in it either. Likewise, he couldn't see Koizumi being interested in his forensics either.

They moved conversation on to other topics. Life, day to day work, people of mutual acquaintance, who had moved where after graduation. Koizumi had a far reaching network she kept in touch with, and this surprised Saguru. While she had always been surrounded by people, she hadn't seemed to care much about who those people were so long as they had their attention focused in her direction. Perhaps things had changed in more ways than one since high school.

~O~O~O~

The wedding and reception were being held in the same venue. Not unheard of, but certainly not what Saguru was used to. More so than the arrangement was the hall that caught Saguru off guard. The color scheme was white with Kid's trademark pale blue with a few red roses and hidden clover motifs to finish the effect off.

Saguru almost stopped walked, internally torn between laughter and horror. Clearly Kuroba had confessed his identity to Aoko at some point or there would not be near so many veiled references. Clearly Kuroba was just as unhinged as Saguru always thought he must be at some level because he'd included all these hints when Nakamori-keibu was going to be his father in law. Saguru wasn't even sure what to think.

Akako pulled him by the arm to their table with little placards with their names on it and Saguru followed in a daze, too caught up in his thoughts to be caught up in his date for the moment.

It was only as the tables filled up that he pulled himself from his mind. Koizumi, surprisingly, didn't look insulted by his distraction. Instead, she nodded at the red roses at the bride and groom's intended table, tied with blue ribbon and flanked by white candles with four leaf clovers set into the wax.

"Kuroba can't be subtle can he?"

Saguru blinked, then blinked again, for surely he was misinterpreting her meaning. Koizumi had never seemed to believe Saguru's claims that Kuroba was Kid years ago. She must mean the ostentatious bouquet that undoubtedly had a dozen roses with perfect, red blooms and their thorns removed.

He considered asking her to clarify regardless, but from the corner of his eye he saw Kuroba—dressed in a white suit that had more than a passing resemblance to Kid's chosen attire, really, Kuroba, was he trying to bait Nakamori?—heading toward the front of the room with someone who had to be the master of ceremonies.

He'd think about it more after the wedding was over.

The wedding itself was brief and Western styled. This came as no big surprise as Saguru couldn't imagine either Aoko or Kuroba in traditional clothing, let alone going through a traditional wedding ceremony, and the location alone had indicated that it would be Western. It was not at all religious, however. Nakamori-keibu walked Aoko to a waiting Kuroba, vows were exchanged, they kissed, the guests made happy sounds of approval, and it was on to the reception.

"Well, that was…pretty," Koizumi said. She swirled the champagne they'd been given for a toast around in her glass. It fizzed.

"It was remarkably normal," Saguru said, sipping his own glass. It was too sweet for his taste, likely because it had been chosen for Aoko and Kuroba's tastes. "I expected something to explode."

"I doubt Aoko-chan would have let Kuroba-kun get away with that." She snorted. "He'll probably slip up later or give into temptation. If he's lucky it will make her laugh rather than get annoyed."

Across the room, Aoko and Kuroba sat at their table with Nakamori-keibu and Kuroba's mother. At the corners of the room, waiters were coming with food on trays for guests.

"It will be the cake," Saguru said with certainty. "That's his best bet of making her laugh rather than getting upset."

"By exploding a wedding cake?" Koizumi asked skeptically.

"Not exploding, probably. Just something equally dramatic, and given the circumstances, likely romantically inclined. Kuroba does raise doves, does he not?"

"Hmm." Koizumi tilted her glass so candle light refracted through it. "Doves would be perfect for the occasion."

Up at the table, Aoko leaned over to kiss Kuroba. Kuroba had a ridiculously wide smile on his face and looked like he thought he was the luckiest man alive. Saguru had to agree that Kuroba was fortunate to have Aoko in his life. Especially as she had apparently stayed in his life after he revealed his secret.

"How long," Koizumi said with a speculative air, tilting her head to the side, "do you think it will take before they have children."

Saguru looked at her, aghast. "Dear lord, I hope it is a long time coming. Their children will be terrors. Any child of Kuroba is automatically going to be impossible, but add the famous Nakamori temper on top of that?"

Koizumi smirked. "You're terrified of children aren't you?"

"I have nothing against children; it's just the potential future Kuroba progeny. I can just picture one of them deciding I was suitable for babysitting and leaving me with a child that would likely tie me to my own chair and proceed to destroy the study or something."

"You're missing the positive sides of Aoko-chan's influence." Koizumi lifted a finger. "Aoko-chan would never be okay with her child destroying someone's property."

"No, but she would likely be okay with said potential child tying up a babysitter or otherwise pranking the person into submission."

Koizumi took another sip of champagne. "Hmm. Probably. But she'd also lecture the kid about it even if it privately amused her."

Saguru shuddered. "I am too sober to contemplate the continuation of the Kuroba bloodline at the moment." Thankfully there was an open bar.

"Wine?" Koizumi asked.

"Wine."

"Bring me back a glass as well."

~O~O~O~

After the third glass of wine, a good meal, and an exploding cake—he'd called it on the doves, but he hadn't expected the roses or sparklers that added to the romantic atmosphere—Saguru was just drunk enough to have the courage to dance.

Ordinarily he didn't have the courage to dance at the best of times on his own, let alone with a date, but the current music was a waltz and Saguru had taken ballroom dance before, and with a bit of wine in him, it seemed a bit more likely that Koizumi would agree to dance than before the wine. And by then, he actually wanted to dance with her.

There was something abnormally alluring about Koizumi, Saguru thought as he brought back more wine—his fourth glass, her third. Physically, Koizumi was visually appealing with sleek curves he could appreciate. Her face was beautiful, but not in a warm and approachable way the way he could remember thinking of Aoko. Aoko was someone who was plain until they smiled. Koizumi was like a statue to be admired but not touched. The more the night went on, the more he wanted to—touch that is. To see if her hair was truly as silky as it looked or her skin as soft or how the curve of her waist would fit along his palm. It was like a bubble he wasn't sure could be breached or even if Koizumi would want it to be crossed.

Setting down the wine at their table, he held out a hand. "Koizumi-san…would you care to dance?"

Koizumi's gaze followed his hand up his arm and to his face. For a nerve wracking moment, he felt her analyze him with as much scrutiny as he gave some criminals like she was checking him for sincerity or motive. Whatever she found, she approved of, because she smiled and put her hand in his. "One dance. I suppose there isn't much point to these sorts of things if we don't dance at least once."

Bare leg flashed as she stood, ruffles framing it appealingly. It was calculated, he knew it was calculated, but he found himself falling for it all the same.

Koizumi had an eyebrow raised when he managed to look back at her face. "I always thought you were in control back in high school. So serious all the time."

"I…had other things to distract my attention," he admitted. He glanced at where Aoko and Kuroba were waltzing.

"Of course, Kuroba." Koizumi laughed and stepped close. "If I didn't know better I'd say that you were a bit too interested in his business back then."

Saguru sputtered. And Koizumi laughed. They moved into the sway of the dance.

"Relax. I'm only joking. Besides, Kuroba is an easy man to get carried away in."

Saguru wished he could disagree…but Kuroba truly was a distracting, maddening individual that would take up your world if you let him. And for a period of time, Saguru couldn't deny that Kuroba and Kid were the centers of his world in some way, shape or form. "…I take it that is experience talking?"

"He's the only one to get away," Koizumi sighed. She didn't look too upset about that though, just mildly wistful. "It wouldn't have worked out anyway. Although," she watched Kuroba dip Aoko as Aoko laughed. "Aoko-chan probably wished she listened to you back in high school."

Saguru almost missed the next step. "You…"

"I found out in a far different way than you did, and I suppose I hoped I could use it against him in the beginning. That didn't last long." Koizumi kept him in step with the dance, taking the lead for a few seconds as he regained his footing. "In fact," she said lightly, "I helped him getting caught by you once."

The amusement in her eyes made it harder to try and pinpoint the time. Hazy memories flitted through his mind of high school, some sharper than others. "…the time Kid screamed like a girl."

"Not my finest moment, I will admit."

"I didn't think anything of the voice back then. Kid was known to be able to change his voice to fit anyone after all." He shook his head. "Why?"

Koizumi smiled darkly. It didn't reach her eyes. "At the time, no one was allowed to catch Kaito-kun before I had caught his heart. A silly motivation thinking back, but as I said, he's the one that got away. I was so angry he wasn't interested so it was purely to satisfy my ego at first, but…"

"But Kuroba isn't someone you can remain impersonal with," Saguru said, thinking of the times where he had warned Kuroba or tried to protect him instead of catching him because for all that Kid broke the law, he didn't cause harm.

"No." She pulled away as the waltz moved into something faster and more popular. Koizumi did a small twirl that caused her skirt to flare around her. "His loss," she said. "Who wouldn't want a young, pretty, smart, powerful woman like myself?"

"Who indeed?" Kuroba had never looked twice at Koizumi; he had been wrapped up in Aoko since before either Saguru or Koizumi had met him.

Koizumi laughed and stepped in close again, getting Saguru to twirl with her. "And you?" she asked, breathless when they stopped spinning, holding on to each other to keep balance with dizziness and alcohol interfering with their ability to see straight.

"Me?"

"Are you interested in a woman like me?"

Saguru doubted there were many men who weren't interested in a woman like Koizumi, but he knew it wasn't her looks or outward charm that she meant. He gave as gentlemanly bow as he could with his balance shot. "Koizumi-san, I cannot say that I know you well, but I can say that I would love to get to know you better if you would care to know me as well."

"I might just like that." She kissed his cheek leaving him dazed and flushed. "I need the restroom, but I'll be back soon. Perhaps another dance?"

"Of course."

Saguru stared after her. Her hips swayed just the slightest bit more than was necessary as she walked and her hair moved counterpoint against it.

"So. You and Koizumi."

Saguru flinched and whirled to face Kuroba. Kuroba grinned maddeningly at him. "I beg your pardon?"

"It's unexpected is all."

Saguru wondered where Aoko was. A look around found her at the refreshment table, getting something to drink, which left Saguru all alone with Kuroba for the first time outside of their respective uniforms since high school. "Congratulations on your marriage," Saguru said rather than address Kuroba's topic.

"Thanks." Kuroba's smile was real for a moment, almost blinding in its intensity. "Glad you could come."

"I would have thought you would rather I didn't attend."

"Have you looked around?" Kuroba waved a hand. "Half the task force is here. It would have felt weird not to invite you. Besides, Aoko gets along with you. Heck, even I get along with you sometimes."

"Sometimes." It seemed his dry humor was choosing to show itself now.

Kuroba rolled his eyes. "Yeah. Sometimes. But really, you came with Koizumi?"

"She invited me." Saguru crossed his arms. "I wasn't planning to attend…"

"Well. Be careful, ok?" He scratched his head, his hair going more wild than usual. "Koizumi can be weirdly nice sometimes, but she also likes collecting hearts, if you know what I mean."

"I can look after myself, Kuroba," Saguru said, a bit annoyed and insulted.

"Yeah." He frowned. "And you'd better not just be into her because she's attractive. That's not cool either."

"I'm don't have base motives. I merely agreed to be her date for the wedding." If anything else came out of this, he would not be opposed to it, but he had no expectations that anything would.

"Good." Under his breath, Kuroba muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, "Maybe they'll be good for each other." Saguru decided to pretend he hadn't heard that. "How have you bee—shoot." Kuroba stared over Saguru's shoulder. "I'll talk another time, Aoko can't handle alcohol for crap."

At the refreshment table, someone was having a toast with the bride. Since the contents of the toast were in bar glasses, Saguru doubted it was anything as mild as the champagne from earlier had been. Kuroba moved remarkably fast across the room for someone who had had almost as many drinks as Saguru had had that night. Saguru had been watching.

~O~O~O~

The return to the table for a drink of wine had somehow turned into Koizumi handing him another glass and him accepting it. Saguru knew he was drunk by this point, drunker than he'd ever been and quite likely going to regret the increasingly thoughtless choices he was making, but at the time he couldn't quite bring himself to care. Something about having Koizumi smiling only at him was almost as intoxicating as the wine.

They danced, two songs? Ten? Time didn't seem to matter much as they swayed to a beat that might have matched the music and laughed when one of them stumbled over the other's feet.

Once, Saguru saw Kuroba and Aoko pass by, dancing with their respective parents, all a bit tipsier than they probably would have preferred. The next time he saw them, he and Koizumi were getting a drink—water this time—and getting a break from the dance floor. Kuroba tried to magic a flower for Aoko, and ended up loosing a card deck all over the floor. Aoko laughed uproariously.

"Fifty-two pickup," Saguru muttered, head foggy and reaching the tired stage of being drunk.

"What was that?" Koizumi handed him a glass of water. Somehow she seemed steadier than he did despite drinking almost as much as he had with a good fifty pounds or so less weight to her.

"Kuroba." He nodded at the edge of the dance floor where Aoko was still laughing, crouched on the ground so that her wedding dress bunched around her like a puffy cloud. Kuroba was laughing too, trying to pick up the cards and failing to hold onto them the harder he laughed in some sort of loop of cause and effect.

"I'm happy for them," Koizumi said in the tone of someone deciding something important.

"As am I." It was an odd feeling, but then Saguru didn't have very many people he was close to that he could be happy for. It was probably a bit sad that Kuroba was among the closest considering tonight had been the first time speaking to Kaito as Kaito in several years.

"Hmm…" Koizumi shook herself and turned Saguru to face her with a touch. His skin tingled where her fingers brushed his cheek. "I think the festivities are beginning to slow down. Care to go back to our room?"

'Our.' Saguru's brain seized the phrase and turned it over like it was looking for traps or hidden messages in the word, but he couldn't get a chain of thought to connect like usual. "Yes." He leaned into Koizumi's touch, too much as she had to press her whole palm against his face to steady him. He blinked heavily, his eyes wanting to slide closed even as another equally base portion of his brain wanted to lean into Koizumi's warmth and wrap himself around it. He did neither since he was not in a location where sleeping was acceptable—and he would sleep if he let himself relax enough—and unless Koizumi gave any permission, he wouldn't press the invisible boundaries between them. Dancing was one thing. Touching then was safe because people touched to dance. Koizumi had said yes to that, but to nothing else, so he'd follow her lead in this as he had followed her lead to the wedding.

It was a good thing that the wedding had been at the hotel they were staying at, Saguru thought, because he wasn't sure if he could have managed to get to another location if he had to go further than the twenty meters to the elevator and another ten to the hotel room door.

When the door shut behind then, Koizumi caught his wrist to stop him and leaned up to brush a kiss against his lips. It left his head spinning and his pulse pounding.

"Come to bed?" she asked.

"To sleep or…?" The thought that he was presuming too much bounced around his skull.

"Did I specify to sleep?" Koizumi asked lightly. She put a hand on his shoulder, leaned against his chest, and Saguru caught the edge of the bathroom doorway to keep them upright.

"…Bed would be nice." This sort of thing didn't happen to him. Granted, this was largely due to the fact that Saguru did not seek this sort of situation out—especially not under the influence of more than a bit of alcohol—but also because he did not invite a date to bed after the first date. Or often at all really. Twice to be exact. But he knew Koizumi even if he did not know her intimately.

The juvenile part of his brain informed him that now he had the opportunity to know her very intimately indeed.

This was precisely why he tended to ignore that that part of his brain existed the majority of the time.

Koizumi led him to the bed across the narrow entranceway and into the room proper where the double bed was waiting. They fell onto it in a heap, Koizumi on top. Her dress fanned out around their hips and a distracted part of his brain noted how it was satin. He blushed, realizing he'd lifted hands to her hips automatically.

Koizumi smirked. "You've been such a gentleman tonight, I was starting to wonder if I'd have to put your hands on me to get you to touch."

"I wasn't—I don't want to assume!" Saguru sputtered.

"Shh." Koizumi ran a hand through his hair. "It's nice. I'm just teasing."

The scratch of her nails against his scalp was oddly soothing. Normally he didn't like his hair touched. Saguru's eyelids slid shut and he hummed in pleasure.

"That good?" Koizumi laughed.

" 's nice." Oh dear. He couldn't seem to get his eyes back open again.

Above him Koizumi's weight shifted and her lips met his again. He kissed back, but kept getting distracted by the warmth, the fact that he was now level on a soft surface, and how Koizumi's hand was still massaging into his hair and counterintuitively making him sleepier.

Koizumi pulled back, but he was already drifting off, quite certain he'd feel embarrassed later.

~O~O~O~

When Saguru woke, he was sure of two things: one, he had a mild headache. Two, he wasn't wearing pants and for the life of him, he couldn't think of when he would have lost them. A third observation filtered in when he went to sit up and felt something shift on his chest. Looking down, it turned out to be Koizumi's arm. The rest of Koizumi was why his back and side were so warm. She wasn't wearing he extravagant dress.

Saguru looked away quick, but not before his brain had Koizumi's lacy bra imprinted in his memory. Koizumi was snoring slightly. The probability of moving from the bed and quietly leaving so he could stew in his growing embarrassment did not seem likely since Koizumi had one arm around his chest and a leg he belatedly realized was resting between his calves. As discreetly as he could manage, he laid back down and tugged the sheet up so that it covered Koizumi a bit more modestly. Koizumi wrinkled her nose and snuggled closer to Saguru's back. Saguru tried very hard not to breathe or move or do something else that could wake her up.

Koizumi's hand on his chest moved up and down in a lazy caress.

"You know," she said, voice thick with sleep, "most people are happy to wake up next to me."

"I apologize," Saguru said stiffly. "For last night," he amended.

Koizumi snorted. The hand on his chest pulled her tight against his back. "For falling asleep? I didn't mind. It was cute in a way."

Cute. He blushed in mortification. "Ah. Koizumi-san?"

"Mm? Call me Akako, we're hardly in a formal situation right now."

"…Akako-san, then. What happened to my trousers?"

The hand on his chest lifted and pointed to the closet. Koizumi—Akako's dress hung in it and beside it were his trousers and belt folded neatly over a hanger. The suit jacket hung in there as well.

"…why?"

"It looked uncomfortable. Besides, you don't sleep in a nice suit; it would take hours to get it presentable again." Koizumi lifted her head and she had the same playful leer that Saguru remembered from last night. "Getting the belt off was easy, now getting your slacks off…"

"This is why I do not drink in excess," Saguru muttered, covering his face with his hand.

"Like I said, it was cute." Akako propped her head on a hand. "It was interesting to see you relaxed. Somehow I expected there to be more rants about cases and less thoughtful silences mixed with in depth discussions about possible habits of other wedding attendees."

Saguru flushed. He vaguely remembered making a game out of strangers at the surrounding tables during dinner, but it hadn't felt significant at the time. He'd been more caught up in how some of the less probably hypotheses made Koizumi laugh.

"You're a good dancer though, even drunk. That's not as much of a surprise though."

Saguru blinked as Akako leaned over him. When she kissed him he was one part stunned, another part pleased, and a small part annoyed that it was somewhat ruined by morning breath. He wrinkled his nose, not sure how to bring that last bit up without ruining the moment.

Koizumi laughed when she pulled away. "Continue this after cleaning up a bit? I was serious about my interest in taking you to bed."

Saguru hesitated for a second, a hundred reasons why he should or should not decide one way or another weighing through his mind. But they were both sober now, and both still interested, and in the end he couldn't think of a firm reason why he didn't want this and enough reason for why he did. "Yes."

~O~O~O~

Eventually they cleaned up and made it down to the lobby for a complimentary breakfast—although by then it was closer to a brunch. Of course Kuroba was there.

"Is that a hickey?" Kuroba asked, staring at the space above Saguru's collar with exaggerated shock and horror.

"That," Saguru said, filling a cup with hot water for tea, "is none of your business."

"Holy shit, you actually slept with Koizumi."

Saguru glanced at where Akako and Aoko were debating between a Western breakfast of toast and eggs or ordering a traditional breakfast from the kitchens. Other wedding guests were scattered at various tables. In one corner, Nakamori-keibu was nursing a cup of coffee and looked to be suffering through a hangover. "Please," he said drily, "announce that to the whole world." Before Kuroba could shoot a comeback at him he said, "I don't regret the choice or yesterday's date either. Although, really Kuroba, what did you expect when you required us to bring dates?"

"It was a joke." Kuroba drank milky, too sweet coffee on automatic. "I mean it would be stupid if everyone had to bring a date, but it seemed like it would be funny to see who you and Koizumi brought…"

"Well." Saguru looked at the self-serve food items and selected a cup of fruit and grabbed bread for toast. "I suppose I have to thank you for the lovely opportunity to share my time with Akako-san."

Kuroba's eye twitched.

"And it looks like we will all be eating breakfast together," Saguru added as Aoko and Akako, having placed an order for a traditional breakfast after all, made their way together to a table with four chairs.

"I created an unholy alliance, didn't I?" Kuroba muttered.

Unholy? Saguru raised a brow.

"What did you two even talk about?"

"Truthfully? Literature. People. Our mutual experiences regarding you." Saguru smiled thinly. "You in particular are a wonderful conversational topic. We could discuss you all day."

"…please don't."

"Of course not." As they sat down to breakfast, Saguru felt content. And from the smile Akako sent his way, he had the feeling that this wouldn't be the last time they went out together. Altogether it was a much better time than his last date.


End file.
